NCTA to FCC: Keep 'Plug-and-Play' Rules Unplugged

The National Cable & Telecommunications Association has come out swinging against TiVo's effort to reinstate cable regulations the NCTA says are unnecessary vestiges of the Federal Communications Commission's 2003 Plug and Play Order, which was vacated by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit earlier this year in the EchoStar case.

"[T]he Commission should reject the Petition and decline to open a rulemaking proceeding to reinstate those regulations," said NCTA. And if the FCC does try to reinstate them, said NCTA, they should come with an expiration date. Among the rules TiVo wants reinstated are limits on the levels of copy protection for pay-TV-distributed content, but only for cable operators.